


five times merlin almost tells gwen (and the one time he does)

by jontinf



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, Magic Reveal, Male-Female Friendship, Romantic Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 17:11:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1612898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jontinf/pseuds/jontinf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin wonders if there is anything about Gwen that isn’t unconditional.</p>
            </blockquote>





	five times merlin almost tells gwen (and the one time he does)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rubberglue](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rubberglue/gifts).



> The story is set after “The Nightmare Begins” (2x03) and continues through to “The Sword in the Stone Pt. II” (4x13). It becomes AU with 4x13. 
> 
> (Written in December 2011)

_I love you as one loves certain obscure things,_

_secretly, between the shadow and the soul._

One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII

— Pablo Neruda

 

1.

Everything suddenly makes sense about Arthur’s words to him the day prior, all those warnings about status and the futility of Merlin having “affections for the Lady Morgana.” He hadn’t even considered the resigned distance in Arthur’s eyes as he spoke to him, not until now.

He sees the same expression on Gwen’s face when he asks her whether she likes Arthur, cares for him in a way that promised heartache and thoughts of futility. This is the first thing he can think of saying after she tells him everything, and he knows the answer when she says nothing.

They'd been spending the late afternoon hanging the wash together. Pegs slipping easily from his fingers to hers as she told him that she’d be accompanying Morgana on a pilgrimage to Gorlois’s grave the next day.

He mentioned how “Sir” William’s village was not far from there. Her answer was a mere  _is that so?_

He went on about how well he thought the whole tournament business had turned out, despite certain near fatal complications. Gwen just looked like she’d been caught in a lie and that there was nothing left to do but come clean.

When he said her name to pluck her out of silence, she told him everything, everything from the snoring and the plates from the castle kitchens— her eyes narrowing on him knowingly as it immediately dawned on her that Merlin played a part in that particular deceptive project—to the morning of the last match and all that was said (and not said) afterward.

He can tell that she hasn't spoken of this with anyone. Perhaps she hadn’t planned on doing so. How do you talk about something that never should have happened, something that was never going to happen?

And now they sit pensively in between the swaying bedclothes that they’ve hung on the lines, the breeze moving them slow and heavy against their bodies.

“Morgana’s been troubled. I couldn’t burden her. I shouldn’t burden you either.”

Merlin places his hand at the crook of her arm. “No, I’m glad to hear it.” He blinks and laughs sheepishly, “I mean I’m not  _glad_  to hear it.”

He feels guilty that he’s not better at this. Although how often does something like this happen? Should he tell her about Arthur— that it seems as if there could be hope? Or will she take it differently? It is in the best interest of her heart, both hers and Arthur’s, to think that way.

Gwen smiles fondly, muttering something about how he and she have spent so much time together that they’re starting to sound like each other.

Somehow there’s nothing left to say about the matter after that. Not in this one moment. When he’ll later return to Gaius’s quarters, he’ll be overcome with a sudden urge to tease the both of them (he frankly feels entitled to it) and thereafter will come another feeling of gratefulness that out of all the women he could have fallen for, Arthur had fallen for Gwen, his Gwen.

Eventually, they return to work, the mood having grown lighter.

“What about you, Merlin?”

“Hmm?”

His eyes shift anxiously; yet again he readies himself to tackle another conversation on his love life or lack thereof.

“Secrets,” she says.

Oh.

He smoothes cotton against rope. She has just told him her biggest secret. Could he be able to do the same?

The thought quickly fades in his mind. But it wasn’t the same.

“I’d probably get…” he pauses, considering his next words carefully. He doesn’t want to outright lie to her. “I would be…sacked if anyone knew  _my_ secrets.”

She watches him with a tiny glint of curiosity, until it softens into a gaze of contentment, as though she already knows all the secrets that someone like him would have to tell.

“I can’t sack you, Merlin. I wouldn’t if I could.”

2.

“I heard a rumor that you were upset.”

She has stepped into the armory without his even realizing. Merlin has been the only one there for a long while, quietly scrubbing at the breastplate of Arthur’s armor in a corner, one of the many tasks he’d been instructed to do that morning. He makes an effort not to wallow, but jobs as mundane as these tend to make it difficult for his mind not wander back to promises made in catacombs and the lake where they were put to rest.

He tries to smile. The best he can manage is stoicism. He is slightly better at sounding cheerful.

“I’m better. I am.”

He believes that he’s telling her the truth, but she still approaches him, unconvinced, bending her body to meet his gaze, her hands on her knees, hair tumbling in front of her, and looking as if she were addressing a lost child. She is teasing, gentle, as she tries to coax him to say more, a game of twenty questions.

“Does it have anything to do with the moth infestation?”

They both smile at each other. He shakes his head.

“Is it Arthur?” she whispers, almost conspiratorially, “It’s always Arthur, isn’t it?”

He wants to just say yes. Arthur is a prat. He is always a prat. (Though today was different with Arthur, in its own way.) She will accept this as an answer if he wants her to. Or so he presumes.

Gwen sits down next to him, back straight against the wall, and cradles Arthur’s gauntlet in her lap, idly pressing her fingertips to its steel ones. This is the closest she has come to touching the prince in months, the most that she will dare to. Sometimes it baffles him, the extent to which they’ve both been denied and their ability to withstand it.

She looks down at the gauntlet thoughtfully, and asks with a voice that sounds thick and sure, “Or could it have to do with Lady Morgana’s dress… and the girl you gave it to?”

Merlin breathes out, not quite having it in him to make more inane excuses. Perhaps he might offer Arthur’s theories of cross dressing, if the royal blabbermouth hadn’t somehow shared them with Gwen by now.

 “Gwen. I’ll find a way to pay for another one.”

“Oh, I don’t think it’ll be missed,” she calmly assures him. He remembers that Morgana rarely wore the dress. It wasn’t her favorite, eventually, it will be replaced. “And, Merlin, that dress costs a year’s wages.”

Gwen rubs her legs, which are sore from carrying out her own chores. She looks upon him wistfully. “This girl must mean quite a lot to you.”

He closes his eyes, and an answer comes out of his mouth. He is always thinking quickly on his feet, a habit he can’t shake, even when he thinks he has lost the ability.

“I met her too late.”

“And is it too late to win her back?” There is something so innocently hopeful about the way she asks this, as though things could be that simple.

He looks at her consolingly, now feeling like the adult burdened to explain to a young girl that this is a story that won’t have a happy ending. “Something like that.”

Gwen nods, her lips pout a little and interrupt the stillness of the room. What he hasn’t realized is that she was ready for such an answer.

She pats his leg and immediately stands up. “George and I will take care of your chores for the day.”

Dumbstruck, Merlin lets her toss the cloth from his hands, and he lets her tug at his arms, pulling his body up from the ground. It’s a graceless sight, his long legs and her smallness, moving like she’s tugging at a stubborn thread of a dress caught on a nail.

 “George?” he asks.

“He’s  _very_  good at polishing, and he owes me a favor.”

“Gwen.”

Walking to the door, she offers over her shoulder, “If you need an ear, I can be done by dinner.”

“Gwen.”

He finally gets her to stop and turn around. She waits for him to say what he needs to say.

He could tell her everything.What if he told her _everything_?

“Gwen,” he breathes. His eyes start to blur with the threat of tears. He knows if he breaks, it’ll happen. She will know everything. He swallows hard. “Thank you.”

Her smile in return is full of dazzling, doting warmth.

“I didn’t like to see you upset.”

3.

Some of the courtiers duck their heads, shielding their faces behind their arms, when the reach of the fire that Trickler puffs out grows a little too close. Arthur’s hand instinctively grazes his sword when this happens, having kept an eye on the man throughout the evening, an undertaking unconsciously performed alongside making conversation with each of the five kings, including his father. Trickler only bows and waves, continuing to skip around the hall gleefully.

Arthur is not the only one who has been watching. Merlin stands next to Gwen at a table far from where the guests and royal family sit. They both set down empty pitchers for wine.

 “Odd that Uther allows magicians in court,” Merlin says.

 “Tricks and sleights of hand never hurt anyone. Even Uther knows that.”

Gwen seems to be in good spirits tonight, quite a feat, since she’s been tasked to cater to every whim of the Lady Vivian. He thinks it may be the general mood of the room, buzzing with the promise of a new age of peace and prosperity. Even the hall appears adorned with greater splendor than typical for these occasions.

“Merlin,” she calls. Her hands land on his shoulders, playfully directing his attention to only her.

Gwen pulls up her sleeves and takes a coin out of the pocket of her dress. “Do you see this?”

“Yes.”

“It’s a coin.”

“Thank you.”

She puts on a face of sincere professionalism, or attempts it, a grin itching to escape the corners of her mouth, then stuffs the coin into her fist like a handkerchief and holds out her hands in front of her, wiggling slim fingers to show that her hands are empty and that the coin has vanished.

Merlin laughs. “Where did you learn that?”

“A magician never reveals her secrets.”

She takes a full pitcher from the table and grins mischievously, very nearly proudly. Arthur has been watching all of this, a timid, giddy smile planted on his lips, and when she leaves the table, both Merlin and Arthur’s gazes follow her across the room as she returns to Morgana, who beams at having her back.

Gwen laughs at something Morgana whispers to her, a hand slipping the coin back into her pocket. Merlin feels what can only be described as homesickness and something else, something beguilingly exhilarating, as though he’s suddenly remembered something he’d been trying to remember for a long while.

He finds himself stepping behind a candelabrum and wills a small ball of light to glow in the palm of his hand. When Merlin looks up to find Gwen, he instead sees Gaius staring at him disapprovingly with a look that says _are you out of your mind?_

The next morning, he attributes this recklessness to wine, and the room, full of the promise of peace and prosperity, and a girl, sweetly beckoning courage within all those who seek it.

4.

It’s been two days after Gwen’s release, and Morgana has given her the night off, stating that she was owed at least that after everything she’d been through.

But Morgana has gotten into the habit of abruptly dismissing her from work. Gwen recalls the air in those chambers when she returns in the mornings, a place she’d spent so many years, now feeling so tomblike and unsettlingly still, and she tells Merlin all this with a sense of trepidation, as if to urge him to keep an eye on her mistress when she cannot.

He asks to walk her home, and he leans the back of his head against the wall outside the citadel as he waits for her, lost in thought and dread and a creeping guilt for what he fears is yet to come.  He will always feel guilt for the Morgana that returned to Camelot.

When Gwen arrives, she tugs at his sleeve. “Missing the tavern, are we?”

“He told you?” He’s not sure who he loathes more in this moment, Gaius or Arthur.

She shakes her head, more amused than anything. “It is sweet of you to walk me home.”

Gwen doesn’t seem to bear any grudge. On the other hand, every look that Arthur has thrown Merlin’s way has been laced with the promise to push him off one of the castle towers.

Merlin wonders if there is anything about Gwen that isn’t unconditional.

“I have something for you.” He takes a pouch out from his jacket pocket and gives it to her. “It’s from him. He mentioned something about a farm.”

Gwen pulls open the pouch and pours its contents gently onto her palm. They are seeds. Her gasp becomes a soft chuckle. Her fingers roll the seeds in her palm with a quiet sense of awe.

“This is perfect,” she tells him. “I shall treasure them.”

He wants to ask what kind of man gives seeds instead of flowers, but it seems that whatever message Arthur intended has been successfully conveyed, and perhaps this is one thing that need not be shared or explained.

They walk silently until they reach lower town. Gwen is the first to say something. Her arms swing happily at her sides, the string of the pouch dangling from her fingers. They speak in near whispers, faces drawn very close.

They look not at each other, but at the townsfolk closing up shop and preparing to end their workday. They don’t want to raise any more suspicions. Even when Gwen’s name has been cleared of sorcery and any _inappropriate_  relationship with the prince of Camelot, the events have still gained her a certain notoriety. Nothing is said to her face, but only a few are discreet about paying a little more attention to her. Somewhere deep down, from a part of himself he shouldn’t be proud of, Merlin ponders the use of jinxes that strike as result of eavesdropping.

“I think I might have a guardian angel.”

“What?”The line is so quaint he doesn’t quite consciously grasp why it alarms him.

 “That old sorcerer saved my life.”

“He-he actually almost got you executed.”

She fidgets, her cheerfulness faltering for a moment.   _Not him,_  she seems to want to say.

It is an exceptional kind of tragedy to have your trust in your best friend shaken. Gwen understands it too painfully well, and he doesn’t let his mind think of Arthur. Once more they take into account how dangerous and senseless things have become.

Gwen quickly recovers composure, and regards Merlin wryly. “A spoiled arrogant brat he may be, but it doesn’t take magic to love him.”

He replies. “It has before.”

She lightly kicks his foot with her shoe in revenge. They approach her doorstep and he leans against the doorframe. “Guardian angels come in the form of doddery old men?”

“Oh, they make the best ones.”

He grins, and he feels so elated, so full, so safe on this doorstep with her, as though the world they are entrenched in everyday ceases to exist on this very spot. What if she could know, what if she figured it out without his explicitly saying, if he set her on the path to knowing? What if she knew because she was meant to, like Lancelot and Freya and his father?

“What if I told you—”

She opens the door to the remnants of a ransacked home, the door jamb creaky and loose from when Uther’s knights came to arrest her. He can see that she’s begun to clean things up a bit. The dishes are still broken, slit open bags of grain sit slumped against a wall, her mother’s pillow covers and linens remain torn.

His heart sinks. Uther’s damning words echo in his mind.

_Her father consorted with sorcerers._

 “What if you told me what?” she asks. He feels as though he’s been pulled out of a dream. Everyone always behaves differently in dreams, where one can be rash and possessed and magnificent feats make sense up to the moment of awakening.

She shrugs the shawl off her body. His eyes are scanning the floor of her home, as though something which possesses the answers to all of his problems has fallen down there.

“One day,” Merlin says, “one day, Gwen, you won’t have to hide anymore.”

She squeezes his hand. “Yes.”

5.

The dagger strikes her just above her breast. It was meant for him, aimed at his back, but she sees it first, and on instinct, cries out his name and moves in front of him.

It catches Morgana off guard when she sees Merlin and Gwen fall together to the ground of the throne room. For all the plotting and intention, it always does. His face contorts as history continues to repeat itself again and again, placing a shaky hand over the wound. He is terrified, shouting inconsolable, mangled accusations about friendship and revulsion and  _why_. He says this all to Morgana, to this room, and to himself.

Agravaine tells Morgana that they need to leave and regroup with Helios. Arthur and his knights are near, the story of a sword spreading and a revolution gaining numbers as quickly as the move to reclaim Camelot. He sees Gwen dying, Merlin crouching over her, and briefly considers Morgana’s reaction, but then insists, “My lady.”

Morgana and Merlin share a hard look, and then she flees.

He rests Gwen’s head on his lap, both of them shivering. “You can still stop her,” she says. “Merlin _.”_

She closes her eyes. It seems poetic in some strange, wretched way, that she is in the throne room, where all the bodies of Camelot’s kings and queens have lain in state. Perhaps this is all it would come to, Guinevere of Camelot, the blacksmith’s daughter who was once loved by a king and died like a queen.

Blood and gold begin to pool under Merlin’s palm.

 “Not again,” he says. “Not you. Not  _you.”_

The light becomes dizzying, brighter, blinding. She places her hand on top of his.

6.

New silk gowns and jewelry are arranged on the bed of her temporary castle quarters, shimmering like apparitions in the early morning light. These are meant for her to wear during the week long festivities after the ceremony.

Gwen feels dazed looking at them, aware that she wasn’t allowed to make it this far the first time, and when she hears a quiet knocking at the door, she expects the worst, ready for another reason to run. She’s been running for so long.

“Come in.”

Merlin enters in his new red coat. They haven’t exchanged a word since those moments in the throne room together, when it all almost ended. Strange how that time feels so unreal now.

When their eyes meet, he looks relieved to find her alone, and she smiles faintly at the realization that she’s not the only one to receive new clothes. He is now the advisor to the King, unable  _not_  to smile back at a woman moments away from becoming Queen, wryly tipping his head toward the gowns, as if to say,  _all of these beautiful things, they belong to you now._

In his hands, he holds Excalibur, the finest sword her father made and her people’s last hope. Carefully, Merlin kneels in front of her and places the sword on her lap, letting it shine against the embroidery of her wedding dress.

She touches the familiar steel reverently; something catches in her chest. How is it possible to feel so many things at once?

 “There’s something that I’ve wanted to tell you for some time,” he says, his voice fluttering on the last words, the sound of it fading into the air.

Gwen looks back at him with tears in her eyes, Excalibur under her fingertips, embodying so much of the future and having born witness to the past, of the quiet deed that gave her this day, of an extraordinary boy and the girl who could grant him anything.

She whispers. “I know.”


End file.
